UK ICO urges US to answer DPAs’ Privacy Shield questions



The UK Information Commissioner, Christopher Graham, says that the questions the EU DPA’s Article 29 Data Protection Working Party posed on the proposed EU-US Privacy Shield should be answered as a first priority.

“The Article 29 Group has posed some simple, relevant questions. You can be sure that the European Court of Justice would also be asking these questions. I would say to the US corporates, which have a great interest in this, go and talk to your government representatives to sort this out,” Graham said yesterday in London at the Westminster eForum.

The EU DPAs are still concerned about the role of the proposed US Ombudsman, data retention and indiscriminate surveillance.

Graham would not speculate what the opinion of the Article 31 Committee, consisting of Member States’ representatives, would be. The adequacy decision, which is sought for the Privacy Shield, would need to be adopted pursuant to the so-called "comitology procedure". This requires an opinion of the Article 31 Committee delivered by a qualified majority of Member States. The next step would be the adoption of the decision by the College of Commissioners, which is expected by mid-June.